


a long dirty war

by driedvoices



Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-13
Updated: 2012-11-13
Packaged: 2017-11-18 13:55:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/561791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/driedvoices/pseuds/driedvoices
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Maybe you missed me." </p>
<p>The one where Lucy haunts Desmond and there's a little rhyme, a little reason. AU for ACIII and a bit of Revelations.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a long dirty war

**Author's Note:**

> So! A few things you should know:
> 
> 1\. I was very unhappy with the way canon handled Lucy (and will heretofore disregard most of it), and
> 
> 2\. I was very unhappy with the ending of ACIII. 
> 
> This is my attempt at a fix-it fic.

Rebecca is disconnecting him from the Animus, her jaw locked shut and her gaze settled on individual parts of him—his shoulder, his neck, his wrist—when he looks up and says: "Lucy?"

She flinches visibly and her mouth falls open before she has a chance to stop herself. "Lucy's dead, Desmond," she recovers, turning her back to him. "Wake up." 

Behind her, Lucy stares at him wide-eyed. 

-

"How are you here?" he murmurs later, once he's escaped everyone's hearing under the pretense of exploring the ruins. He wonders how long it'll be before Rebecca sees that he's turned his earpiece off; he wonders if she'll care. "How did you do it?"

"I think _you_ did it," she tells him, looking down at her hands. She's not all there; Desmond can see particles of dust floating through her in constellations, can see the otherworldly blue glow of the cave parsing through her hair. Her whole body is trembling, or—flickering, like old film. Then maybe she's a projection, a memory, like Juno or Minerva, not some manifestation of his guilt or hysteria or a— "I'm not a ghost, Desmond." 

"Then what?" he demands, keeps his voice to a hiss. "The Apple? Your consciousness got collected, or assimilated somehow?" 

"Your guess is as good as mine."

"Damn it, Lucy, tell me what the fuck I should be _guessing_ at."

She meets his eyes and he feels compelled to hold her gaze; behind her eyes he sees only solid stone. "Maybe you missed me." 

-

"How are you feeling?" William asks him briskly once he climbs down to ground-level. Desmond holds back the bark of laughter, but just barely. 

"What's it to you?" 

"Son," he says—Desmond can't tell if it's a warning or if he's just reminding himself of his familial fucking _obligation_. "That's not necessary. Rebecca said you were talking about Lucy." 

"Just swell, Dad," Desmond breezes. "Peachy keen, a-okay, just aces. Say, do you think we could fit in a baseball game in before the apocalypse, since you're in a bonding kind of mood?"

"Your mental well-being is pertinent to our mission," says William through clenched teeth. "Your sarcasm is not."

He doesn't know why he does it—maybe because he blinks and sees Lucy in the far corner of the room, watching him—but he leans in close and he means it like a threat. "Go ahead, take another swing. You want to, nothing's stopping you—"

"Desmond!" Shaun barks from across the room, standing up at his desk in a panic. He notices Rebecca starting to stir, too, and he backs away, glaring. 

"I'm gonna get some sleep," he mutters, shoving his hands in his pockets. 

"Perhaps that's for the best," William grits out. Desmond doesn't miss the way his fingers twitch, the violence that shouts out in the line of his shoulders, just barely repressed. 

He stalks over to his bedroll and doesn't say a word. 

-

He keeps on exploring with his earpiece off any time he's not in the Animus. As far as he can tell, Rebecca doesn't care enough to bring it up. Maybe she doesn't want to hear him say Lucy's name; maybe it still hurts too much. Hell, he wouldn't blame her. It probably doesn't matter, anyway. 

"You should eat more," Lucy says. She's balanced on one foot on the pillar next to him, more confident in her stance than she had been when she was—before the Temple. When he looks at her form he thinks of Kaniehtí:io, poised in between branches, and smiles faintly. He wonders if she can float, but doesn't ask her. Insensitivity is not something he wants to risk right now, when she's here, in whatever capacity, when she's talking to him and existing, even if it's just in his head. "You look like hell." 

"I thought you said I was getting fat." 

"You were," she shrugs, and sits, kicks her legs out in front of her and lets them dangle off the edge. "I guess my dying took a lot out of you."

"Don't," he winces, unsuccessfully fighting the urge to curl in on himself. "Don't make jokes."

"Hey, it wasn't a walk in the park for me, either." 

"You were a Templar. You were going to give us away, going to go back to Vidic." 

"Says your abusive father and a millennia-old dead god thing who has made it perfectly clear that she hates you," Lucy says reasonably, arching an eyebrow. 

"Maybe you are just a figment of my imagination," says Desmond, digging the heels of his palms into his eyes. "Maybe I'm already crazy and my subconscious just wants to hear that you were innocent."

"Why, so you can beat yourself up over it?" He can hear the irritation in her voice. "Self-loathing doesn't solve anything, Des. I'm dead; you're not yet. Do something about it."

When he pulls his hands away, she's still there.

-

"Did you really see her?" Shaun asks, not bothering to look up from his computer. Desmond pauses in poking around the barrier and stares at him. "Lucy. Did you see her?"

"I was probably hallucinating," Desmond lies. "The bleeding effect—"

"Doesn't work that way, and we both know it. Did she speak to you?"

"Shaun," Desmond falters. He's almost sure that he had something to comforting to say, or wise, but in the end all that comes out is, "Will you stop typing for five seconds?"

Shaun bristles. "I don't know if it's escaped your notice, Desmond, but the world is _ending_. The world is ending," he repeats, softer, "and we have the chance of a snowball in hell to do anything about it, and there's a world full of knowledge, data and art, that will die along with it, so no, Desmond, I will not stop typing. I'm going to sit at my computer and keep trying to research your bloody ancestors and keep trying to contact our other operatives and I am going to absorb every tiny fucking detail of _everything_ on the internet in the time between." 

"Should you really be using our connection for that?" Desmond asks. He should be taken aback by the outburst, should feel some kind of shock. He doesn't. "Seems kind of selfish."

"If I can't be a bit hedonistic at the end of the world, when can I? It's my choice to make." Shaun's fingers don't still, but they spasm slightly, like they're stretching out a cramp. 

"She told me I missed her."

The glare of the monitor reflects in Shaun's glasses, in his wry grin. "She was always smarter than you."

"Not a hard thing to be," Desmond shrugs, flicks his hidden blade in and out absent-mindedly.

-

"Are you there?" he whispers into his blanket. It's night-time, or at least everyone is sleeping for a moment, fitfully and insufficiently unconscious. 

"Yes," Lucy murmurs back. "Yeah, I'm here." 

He wrenches his eyes open but doesn't glance over his shoulder where he knows she is; he keeps his eyes straight ahead but sees her hand hovering over his, a breath of air from touching. He fights to maintain his stillness, doesn't want to see what'll happen if he flinches, doesn't want to see her fingers pass through him like so many rays of light. "You know that I'm sorry, don't you?"

"And you know it's not going to fix anything." He thinks of Monteriggioni when she sighs, thinks of her breath tickling his forehead in the basement of the villa, of how they dragged their sleeping bags together like it wasn't conspicuous as hell. 

They all sleep scattered, now; the cave shouldn't create more claustrophobia than the crowded sanctuary had, but they put space between themselves like it's hard to breathe. 

"I was going to go to Vidic," Lucy says suddenly. "Juno wasn't wrong. I didn't trust your dad—didn't trust anybody except the four of us, really. But I wouldn't have given us away. I just wanted to know if they had anything—information, drugs, magic, anything that might help us. Help you. I—" She's not corporeal, not _real_ , so he shouldn't be able to hear it when she shifts uncomfortably. But— "I wanted there to be a way to do this without hurting you."

"I don't trust him, either," Desmond tells her softly. "It could have been anyone else—it should have been, really, but it's me and I don't want it, and I sure as shit don't want him telling me what a terrible fucking waste of space I am for not wanting it." 

"You should get some rest."

"Stay," he pleads. "Just—stay here. Talk to me. I want to listen."

"Des—"

"Come on, Lucy."

Another sigh. "This is so not healthy." 

But she stays, talks him to sleep in hushed, private tones, though they both know no one else can hear her. 

-

"You're done for the day," Rebecca says shortly, fiddling with some piece of equipment that Desmond is pretty sure doesn't actually need to be fiddled with. She hasn't looked him in the eye for a while now, let alone smiled. It's funny; he used to think of her as totally unshakeable. Maybe Shaun was right and he's a much bigger idiot than he gives himself credit for. 

"I miss Baby," Desmond says, rolling out the muscles in his shoulders. "I mean, old-school, like back at the safe-house—"

"It was just a machine, Des," Rebecca snaps. She doesn't turn around. 

Desmond sighs. "Look, Rebecca—"

"I really can't do this right now, okay? Go talk to Shaun or your dad or the voices in your head, I really _don't_ care at the moment."

"I know it's hard, but—"

"You don't _know!_ " she bursts out. Desmond steps in front of her and is promptly taken aback by the unfiltered rage he sees on her face. "You don't know anything, Desmond. Lucy was my _friend_. For years, she was my friend. And you knew her for a fraction of a millisecond and then you took her away from us, like it was nothing—because you're the special one, and what you say goes, right? You killed her, Desmond. And I—I have to just sit here and pretend like it's okay. Like it didn't matter. But you wanna know the really fucked up part? Sometimes I think she came out ahead, anyway. She might be dead and blacklisted and what the hell ever, but at least she doesn't have to bullshit around here and wait for the world to end. At least she didn't have time to forget what _living_ feels like." 

Lucy—spasms, is the only word for it, flickering in and out of sight, crouched next to Rebecca and arms poised to hold her. Comfort her. Desmond shakes his head until her image disappears and Rebecca is still glaring at him, still waiting for him to react.

"I can—do you want me to leave?"

Rebecca throws her hands up. "Yes! Yes, Desmond, for the love of god, _leave_."

-

"She really loves you," Des says quietly. 

"I love her, too," Lucy tells him as they stare down at Rebecca and Shaun and William, all milling about in typical fashion. She sits so much closer to him these days; he wonders if she knows how nervous it makes him. 

"She has a _dog_ , Lucy." He winces helplessly, burying his face in his hands. 

"You had a—bar?" she tries, but Desmond just makes an ugly groaning noise in his throat. "Technically, it was _our_ dog."

"What, you got it on weekends?" Des peeks up at her wryly. 

"Ass. We used to live together. Before I got assigned to Abstergo."

"Huh." He watches her watching them, concentrating on the blurry edges of her jaw, her neck. "What's its name?"

"…Alexander." 

"Wasn't he a Templar?" 

"Don't start with me, jerk," she says, sticks her tongue out teasingly. 

"I've been thinking, actually," Des starts, draws his legs up under him. "Connor—Ratonhnhaké:ton—he didn't have a problem with the Templars the way we do. It wasn't wired into him like with us." 

"And?"

"So maybe the divide isn't so big after all. Maybe the reason this war is going on to begin with is that we all grow up in these camps conditioned to hate people we've never met. I mean, if we have the same ends, even if it's just in the short term, do we have to be pitted against each other?"

"Is that really a road you want to go down right now, Des?" Lucy asks quietly. 

Desmond shakes his head and lets his shoulders slump. "I know it doesn't make a difference. Not now, at any rate. It's just been on my mind." 

"Fool," Juno's voice reverberates around them, and he can hear the sneer, "weak, _human_ fool. You think your musings hold relevance even here? You believe you can philosophize an answer, where we who were so much more than you could aspire to be could not? The whore's light blinds you. It—"

"Oh, for Christ's sake, fuck off," Lucy yells. Miraculously, the voice stops. Desmond raises an eyebrow. "She needs to work on her people skills," Lucy shrugs. 

"You talk to her a lot?" 

"More like she talks _at_ me. Constantly. Without cease." 

"What _about_?" 

"Well, incidentally, she has this big master plan of ruling the world. Just, you know, something to keep in mind next time you decide to take her advice or let her possess you."

"Harsh." Desmond makes a face, and Lucy laughs at him.

-

He blows up one day, after a day of letting Haytham save his ass, a day of being compelled to save his in return.

"Why are we all just fucking around like we can make a difference if you all think there's not a chance?" 

Nobody says a word, but William just rubs his temples and sighs. Desmond hooks himself back into the Animus before Rebecca can get up to help him. 

(Connor kills his father and he kills his enemy, and he kills the part of himself that could compromise.

Desmond knows, secondarily, the wrenching-apart that came of it, the hollowed-out feeling that left Connor speechless and consumed with unnamed fury. 

He is still not convinced that it wouldn't be worth it, hypothetically.)

-

His mom used to tell stories when he was a kid. They were probably few and far between, comparatively, but they were a bright spot for him. It wasn't until later that he figured out they weren't really the kind of stories that parents tell their children. No, Desmond heard myths, myths cobbled together from who knows how many civilizations, myths that tell of Those Who Came Before. 

He remembers specifically the judgment of Paris, and the way he'd rolled his eyes and said, "What a moron."

He didn't think he'd actually be put in a perverse mockery of that position in the not-so-distant future. 

Choose, says Minerva, and let the world burn. Let it rise up from its own ashes with you at the helm, let yourself be crowned and revered and loved. But then die. Let people twist your words into lies, let people call you a prophet instead of a man, let wars be fought over words you never said, let the whole bloody cycle start over again until there's a new victim to save the world.

Choose, says Juno, and let me ease the burden. Release me and violate your creed, everything you believe and everything you stand for. Ensure humanity's survival, force them to _submit_. Become your enemy and enslave the Earth. Die.

Paris had it fucking _easy_. 

"This is ridiculous," Des mutters, eyes darting venomously from Juno to Minerva, then back again. 

"Desmond," says William from behind him, but he can't turn because Juno and Minerva are have him locked down under their gaze, and maybe it would be easier—it would probably be over soon, and the sphere is right there. No more responsibility. No more chosen one. No more—

"Desmond," Lucy says, skidding into being next to Juno. "You know you don't have to listen to them."

Immediately, Juno starts to seethe. "Traitorous wretch, turncoat, deceiver—"

" _Lucy_ ," chokes Rebecca. Desmond still can't make himself move, but Lucy shoots a small, consolatory smile over his shoulder before turning back to him. 

"Think about this," she urges. "You know there's another way."

"Foolish girl," says Minerva. "If there were another way we'd have _found_ it."

"Maybe there's not for you," Desmond says. The voice that escapes his throat is ten times louder than he thought he was capable of being, bold and confident. "But it's not you I'm worried about. Maybe you guys had a perfect civilization, but humanity's what we've got, and neither of you know a hell of a lot of them." 

"You cannot save yourselves," Juno chides. "There is only this choice. Take it, Desmond. Choose _me_."

"See, no." Desmond cocks his head. "It's not your way or the highway anymore. People can choose whether or not they want to suffer a tyrant, but it's not my choice to make. You know we'd never find a way to get rid of you if I let you out."

"Time wears thin, Desmond," says Minerva. Juno sneers at him. 

"We can also choose when to go to war. And when to surrender." He does turn, now, and the faces behind him are a mess of confusion and tears. "Shaun, I need you to contact Abstergo. I _know_ they have fail-safes for this. At the very least they can evacuate people to a safe location. Tell them whatever you have to—tell them we'll give them the whole fucking Garden of Eden, and we'll figure something out later." 

"Atta boy," Lucy says softly.

"Right," says Shaun, startling. "Right, I can do that."

"Stop!" Juno shrieks. "You would violate your creed? You would consort with your enemy?"

"You _are_ the enemy," Desmond retorts. "Assassins and Templars are just names we've made up. We're only people, and you hate people. Seems pretty obvious in hindsight, doesn't it? Go on, Shaun, while there's time." Shaun nods and darts back into the main cave, starts typing furiously at his computer. 

"Humans will still die, Desmond Miles," says Minverva. He doesn't think pseudo-goddesses can raise their eyebrows but she's doing a pretty fair job of it.

"Some," Desmond shrugs. "Not all. Civilization as we know it will survive. Abstergo was ready for this; I know they were. And it's in their interests to comply. What good is being a Templar if there's no one to impose your order on?" 

"You would remove responsibility from yourself."

"I would." He holds her gaze. "I don't want this. I never have. People can find another martyr. Presidents and kings and prime ministers, they're equipped to save the world. I'm a bartender who knows how to kill people. My skill set is not really appropriate." 

"Your father, Desmond," says Juno frantically. "Would you disobey him, as well? Would you align yourself with those he hates?"

"You don't know my son at all," snorts William, and Desmond has to crack a smile. 

"You're not going anywhere, Juno," Lucy says, almost sunny. "Crawl back into your hole and rot."

"Impossible," Juno says. She's going fuzzy at the edges, moving towards Desmond and flickering like film that's missing a frame in between, and by the time she reaches him, the pauses have grown so long that she just stops, a hand stretching toward his neck and then she's gone.

"Well done," says Minerva, not quite a smile playing on her lips.

-

"What happens now?" Desmond asks, after the shock has faded. William and Shaun and Rebecca have long since snapped to, making phone calls and bribes, jittering with an energy he hasn't seen in a long time. This is their element, he thinks, but that's not right. This is their hope. 

"That is not for me to know," says Minerva gently. "Too long I have meddled in your affairs. I am not human, as you say. I shall be content to fade into legend, permanently, this time."

Desmond nods, not really sure whether he should be thanking her, or telling her good-bye, or just walking away and promptly forgetting she ever _existed_ , but then he sees Lucy next to him, staring down at Rebecca and Shaun with something like longing, and he _has_ to ask: "What about Lucy? Does she have to leave?"

"That," Minerva says simply, more translucent by the second, "is none of my concern."

And then she's gone. Des turns to Lucy sheepishly, tucks his hands in his pockets when he sees her smile. "So."

"So." She's just on this side of laughing at him. "I guess that's that, then." 

"Unless it falls through and everything Minerva said would happen does." 

"Fingers crossed, Des." 

"It wouldn't be so bad for you." Des cuts his eyes at her slyly. "You could be God."

Her laughter rings short and harsh throughout the temple, even though Des isn't sure whether anyone else can hear. "Sixteen—Clay would like that. Saint Lucy 2.0. But you wouldn't do that to me."

"I really wouldn't." He wouldn't put that burden on himself, on anybody. And a small, selfish part of him wants to be the only one who gets to adore her. "Looks like we don't have to worry about it."

Below, Rebecca is whooping and pumping her fist in the air, just before she runs across the room to kiss a very, very shocked Shaun on the mouth. She even hugs William, which. Des tries not to wince at that. 

"Congratulations, Des. You made the right choice." Maybe it's because the barrier's down, and there's not so much of that blue light, but Lucy's coloring looks almost normal. Almost human. 

"I made the only one. Everyone should have the freedom to choose, right?" 

Lucy snorts. "All the things you could have learned from Caterina Sforza and you remember what she told Ezio in bed."

His grin is slow and warm, spreads over his face like honey and it tastes just as sweet. "It's true, isn't it?" 

There's a challenge in Lucy's eyes. "Nothing is true."

"Then everything is permitted," he answers faithfully. _This_ is permitted. 

He leans in, presses his mouth to hers and feels it.


End file.
